Al Waha 5 Star review

[E.G.]

Well, what with all the premium-brand smoke floating around on this board, let's say we get back to basics for a moment here, eh?
OK, truth be there ain't many brick 'n' mortar places that carry massallal 'round these parts, so I pay the inflated prices for Al Waha and Romann at the mall when I don't want to pay the S&H for premo stuff.
At any rate, for some reason I remember Al Waha's 5 star getting rave reviews sometime over the summer.  A search of the archieve shows my memory has yet to be affected by smoking hookah, as Mr. Bubble and ZooJohnny both sang it's praises (I miss Z.J.'s reviews -- what happened?)
So, to add my 2 bits...
Smell: Hard to say, as my nose has been stuffed up.  Vague impression of very sweet fruit cocktail / non-specific fruit gum.
Texture: A couple of left-over tree branches were picked out, and the leaves often seemed to be attached to the finer stems.  The cut was... rough?  Long threads of leaf, one was 3/4" long.  Probably could have stood to be chopped up a bit with the kitchen knife, but I didn't bother.
Smoke density: My limited experience with Al Waha (cappacunio being the other) makes me think that this stuff likes to be HOT.  I use three lemon-wood coals, and they were resting on the bowl more than usual.  I wandered into mild burn territory right at the start, backed off a bit, and finally found the sweet spot.  Once it was going, the smoke became a nice thick white cloud drifting across the room.  Good for smoke rings  
Flavor:  For the first 10 minutes or so, I didn't notice much.  I haven't cleaned the pipe in a while, though, and I was wondering if the previous bowls had masked it (cappacuino was the last, I'm not sure what was before it).  On the other hand, I also noticed the same thing with the cappucino, so...
After a spell, the flavor suddenly burst out of the hose.  This is a damn fine smoke!  I was worried it was going to be very sicky-sweet, but it's not.  Somehow it manages to balance a sweet fruit flavor with some nice depth, and something floating up top to keep it just a bit clean.
5 flavors?  Cherry dominated, I tasted apple at times, "Hmm, apricot?" drifted through my head once, and I think the complex base might be grape.  Someone claimed strawberry in a previous post, which I didn't get.  They also suggested peach instead of apricot, which very well could be.
This is probably the first massall that I've had where the flavors seem to actually change as the bowl is smoked, as opposed to different notes of the flavor becoming more and or less prominent.
Nose Hits: Nope, sorry.  Stuffy nose as I said, and although "the nose knows" (limited wine tasting experince has demosntrated time and time again that this is indeed the case) I have yet to find a massall that snorting it changed my impression of the flavor.
Buzz: Not much 'til about 25 min. in, and then I started to mellow out a bit.  A well-smoked cigarette will send me into nictoine-hell, so once I start to feel any sort of buzz I usually lay off.  I went about 40 minutes before I cried Uncle, and the bowl was fairly dry -- flavor was still going strong when the last coal went, though, so it probably could have gone a bit longer if you don't mind a bigger kick.
I suspect that this is going to earn a place next to Romann Mango as one that I will always keep on hand.  It'd also make a good intro for newbies to hookah (the mango and A.F.G.S. Eskardani Apple being my other choices.)
Cheers!E.G.

[Mathazar]

Yeah,  I remember someone saying 5-Star was pretty good. 
Al-Amasi is also made by the same company that makes Al-Waha,  and
it sounds like the 5-Star is fairly similair to Al-Amasi Memory
Mix,  except that Memory Mix has a Spearmint flavor to it.  I
LOVE Memory Mix,  as I've got 1000grams of it coming this
week.  The last time I smoked Memory Mix,  I had 500grams of
it and smoked it all in 6 days  .

Thanks for the review of 5-Star.  I've never been a big Al-Waha fan,  but maybe I'll give 5-Star a try 

[E.G.]

True 'nough about the stuffed nose, Tinlid.  It wasn't completly blocked -- if I'm that sick I'm not going to excaberate it by smoking!  But you're right, perhaps I would've picked out some more subtlies if the nasal passages were entirely clear.
E.G.